Ramblings of an Emergency Physician in Texas

Big big Kudos to MovinMeat for bringing data to an argument that seemed doomed to opinion-lock.

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I have pointed out in the past that my BS-meter starts pinging when people start claiming that the ER is only caring for emergent patients and that non-emergency cases are rare. So this set me off, of course. My perception — and that of many of us in the trenches — is that we are absolutely beset by non-emergencies and that the ER is viewed by many as the "convenience clinic," if not the "vicodin clinic." But is this true? How can we quantify this?